The chance of this happening with a mosque, in this same city (don't remember, Italy or France, or something) is pretty small.Mosques are new buildings in France/Italy. Often converted from some other purpose. Rarely, if ever, do they have the feet-thick walls that centuries old catholic churches have. Also, you stop to take off your shoes when entering a mosque, in an area that is already sort of inside and thus a touch cooler than the outside.There's a smaller difference in temperature and you go from scalding to tepid slower.

Just one of the many ways in which religions are geographically anchored. In Italy, all the beautiful places of worship are Catholic, they have beautiful art inside too. In Baghdad, it's mosques. I HAVE come across theists who window-shopped their religion because they were overawed by architecture/sculpture/music.

If you take those people to CERN ... think they would turn Atheist?

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2 Interwebs 7:42And in the seventh year, thou shalt cast out the Nam from thine assembly for he haveth a potty mouth.

It's late in the evening, Odin is having a jovial chat with Heimdall when the spot Loki coming home, grinning ear to ear, newly 'purchased'[1] castagnettes clattering along in his pocket.

Odin: By Me, Loki, do I WANT to know what you pulled this time?Loki: Oh, nothing just a bit of harmless fun.Odin: I remember the last bit of fun you pulled. Thor's beard still hasn't fully grown back. What was it this time?Loki: Well, I went to Hispania ...Heimdall: SpainLoki: What?Heimdall: Spain, they call it Spain now.Loki: Yeah, sure, whatever, anyway, I go to Spain and well, remember that Yahweh fellow?Odin: The Hebrew wargod? What of him?Loki: Well, I switched the sign on some of the temples the various Yahweh sects use.Odin: Good Me, you didn't!

The three of them look over at Spain and see Muslims worshipping at churches and Catholics going into mosques.

Odin: Ok, that IS kind of funny.Heimdall: Yahweh is going to be pissed.Loki: He can go cry me a river for all I care.Heimdall: Hang on, you do remember what happend last time he did that.Odin: And that's why we never invite him over to play kubb anymore.

Hello everyone-long time reader-first time poster.Hope this isn't too late but a couple of pages back there was a bit of chat regarding life elsewhere in the universe. On our planet there has been life for millions of years and over that time there have been millions of species and yet only one has formed languages, learned to read and write, invent things etc.Seeing how infinitely large the universe is I personally think there is a good chance that the right conditions exist elsewhere for life to flourish however it may well only be as advanced as the millions of other species are here. If mankind had not evolved would any other life form here be sending out signals that others could detect?There is always a chance that other life forms are far more advanced than us, have seen how easily we fight amongst ourselves and have decided to turn on their planet cloaking device to avoid ever having to meet with us ! (not meant seriously- but you never know)

Hello everyone-long time reader-first time poster.Hope this isn't too late but a couple of pages back there was a bit of chat regarding life elsewhere in the universe. On our planet there has been life for millions of years and over that time there have been millions of species and yet only one has formed languages, learned to read and write, invent things etc.Seeing how infinitely large the universe is I personally think there is a good chance that the right conditions exist elsewhere for life to flourish however it may well only be as advanced as the millions of other species are here. If mankind had not evolved would any other life form here be sending out signals that others could detect?There is always a chance that other life forms are far more advanced than us, have seen how easily we fight amongst ourselves and have decided to turn on their planet cloaking device to avoid ever having to meet with us ! (not meant seriously- but you never know)

Welcome Jonny-UK

That is a distinct possibility. Someone has to be the ultimate smart life form (and we'll ignore the fact that we probably aren't it, even here on earth. Are Naked Mole Rats fracking for oil? I don't think so.) Anyway, it could easily be that we are the most advanced civilization in our galaxy. But keep in mind that there are 100 billion other galaxies, so we certainly don't know that. And many of them are so far away that radio signals traveling from them won't ever get here while humans are still around.

Each galaxy has an average of 400 billion stars. And that doesn't count the many trillions of dwarf red galaxies that, while they don't look like they could hold life, still might. Plus all that space in between. There might be life forms just floating around having a great old time. And that is if there is only one universe. If there are an infinite number of universes, then it becomes even less likely that we are the only ones intelligent enough to mess up our environment.

Thank you for the welcome.It certainly is fun to think about. I like to think of religion in a similar way i.e looking at it from a distance instead of getting too involved in the details. I have never been a believer and am probably very lacking on a lot religious knowledge compared to many here but I am very happy being this way.

The problem with detecting aliens signals is not just finding an advanced civilisation but finding aliens who exist at the same time as us. Our sun is a third generation star so other aliens would have gone extinct long ago. The main reason we are not finding them appears to be that advanced scientific civilisations are not sustainable for long. Our most likely contact will probably be with automated self repairing machines of a long extinct civilisation. Their lifespan would depend on how long they could recycle materials.

Very true, but then again how much evidence can their ever be for an idea/wish/hope/thought etc ?Yes we can write them down or even draw them but that adds no substance or evidence to the mental image.I see religion in this way, all in the mind, no matter how much is written about it.

FoxyFreedom- Great point.I had not really thought about the time angle. 2001 monoliths now spring to mind.

The main reason we are not finding them appears to be that advanced scientific civilisations are not sustainable for long.

On what civilization do you base this claim? FWIW, I wouldn't call the Romans, Egyptians, or Greeks "advanced", compared to what we see today. Hell, we may not even be considered advanced 2000 years from now.

Maybe she means that as civilizations become more "advanced" they tend to use up their resources quickly and/or kill themselves off with fancier deadly weapons.

Ever read the mote in god's eye?

It deals with a civilization that's stuck in a single solar system. In this book, you need 'jump points' to travel from one star to another. The human solar system had several of these and humans spread out across the galaxy.This other civilization's sole jump point happened to lead to the inside of red supergiant, so whatever ships they built got destroyed the instant they exited at the other jump point.So, this civilization is stuck in a cycle of buildup and war. After every war, falling back to a primitive technological state, relearning everything and forever recycling every last scrap of metal their solar system has to offer.

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2 Interwebs 7:42And in the seventh year, thou shalt cast out the Nam from thine assembly for he haveth a potty mouth.

I meant that advanced civilizations are not sustainable for long compared with evolutionary time. Even if the window of visibility is a few thousand years that is nothing compared with say a dinosaur planet with a visibility of say 500 million years. A dinosaur planet is nothing compared to a visibility window of bacteria up to about 13 billion years. It is possible though there is no proof that self designing and self repairing machines could have a visibility window of about 7 billion years, long after the civilizations which created them have become extinct. They could journey between stars coasting at low speeds for millions of years. This much more likely than aliens travelling for millions of years.

Whether we find alien bacteria or intelligent machines first will depend on the methods we use to find them.

If intelligent machines sound far fetched, we are almost at the intelligent machine age ourselves. If computers continue to advance at the same rate they have always done, they will overtake humans by about 2040. Within only a few years after that they will be a million times more intelligent than any human and they will be designing and building themselves with self repairing fabric if they are wired to a factory. What government could resist wanting to outwit its rivals?